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Long Covid is a debilitating long-term illness that is affecting the lives of so many people. Today on the And She Spoke Podcast, Jeni shares how she navigated this chronic illness while running the business. We also discuss how the nature of Jeni’s job and how the flexibility and financial freedom of entrepreneurship saved her during this challenging time.
For so many modern, driven women, life is about being more than one thing. We’re multidimensional—and so are our conversations. We carry multiple identities; we can be both mother and artist; both attorney and entrepreneur. Both clinician and CEO. Both humble and proud. Life for women like us is about both. About…all of the above. It’s about the “and”...
100_Entrepreneurship & COVID
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Angie Spoke podcast. Well, hi. Hi, Jenny. Got a big story today. Are you ready? Yeah, this is, yeah, I'm ready. This is a personal one, but I think it's got some, it's important to share it. . Yeah. So, okay, well let me just preface it by, we're gonna go back to, um, March of 2020 beginning of Covid and when all hell broke loose throughout the world and including in our little company and you were really sick.
Mm-hmm. . And so this is the story of Jenny having Covid and ultimately long C O V I D while we were in the most insane time of. Company, I actually have no idea how you did what you did. And a couple weeks ago we were supposed to podcast and I wasn't feeling well and I had a headache and I was lying on that couch behind me and I [00:01:00] couldn't even sit here and talk to you, and I was not going through what you were going through with the fevers and so on.
And so I just marvel at what you are able to. Do. And I know it's kind of like you don't have a choice, but I think, so this, this is why we wanted to tell, tell this story because a lot of people have, um, long covid now, and it's a much more known thing. It wasn't, we, it was a long what back then, like, we didn't even know.
So let me turn it over to you, Jenny, to, to maybe start at the beginning of what those first few weeks and months were like when you realized that you were ill. Yeah. So yeah, so this is gonna be a bit of a story and I think I, I just wanna kind of get as much of it out in this episode as possible, because I know, just statistically speaking, I don't know worldwide, but in the United States, I just saw a statistic that it's 7.5% of American adults have [00:02:00] long C.
So a lot of people. Millions and millions of people have this, this illness. And it's been in, in some articles I've read, and I've spent a lot of time studying long covid in the last two and a half years. Um, say that, you know, up to 30% of the people who ever get covid have long covid for some period of time.
And so it's still kind of this medical mystery. Um, we don't know exactly what's going on. I, I think there's, there some people think that there's, um, The virus is still hiding in kind of protected areas of the body. And other people think that your immune system is just really damaged from Covid itself.
And there's people that think it's a combination of both. And then there's people that have all kinds of other outlandish theories. And so, um, just also wanna say like, I don't know any of the answers to that, obviously, but I, I, I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out cuz it's my body and I still have.
So I also will say that too, like I still walk [00:03:00] the world upon Covid and I don't know if it'll ever be gone. Um, it's almost three years for me. And I know from hearing stories and reading articles about people who had, um, some of the original, like some of the previous coronaviruses that broke out in other parts of the world decades ago, that like sometimes it takes four years to get over something like this.
Hopefully I'm close to being all the way done. I'm definitely better, but I just wanna say like this is, we're doing this episode because I've never seen anyone talk about the relationship between long covid and entrepreneurship, and I think it's really important to talk about, so, Go ahead and start with the beginning.
So I was living in Washington and if, if for those of you in North America, you may remember that like the first cases in North America were, do like early on, were documented and, and in and around Seattle. And, um, my husband at the time was working at Amazon. and his team was back and forth to [00:04:00] China. So his building, like, it was like very much in our lives.
Like the earliest Kate documented cases in the US were from really close to where we lived. Um, and he, he was telling me about people who were really sick in the office. And so, um, whatever. I got sick. Like I got sick, like I thought it was the flu, um, early in 2020. Actually late in 2019. Um, and I think there's a lot of evidence that Covid was already circulating in December in North America.
I got really sick, just like really sick, like a flu, sick, like I had a bad headache. I was super congested. I had the chills, like, and then I had this cough that wasn't, this like, wasn't going away. I went to the doctor. I had chest x-rays done. Um, , like I was just told. Yeah, I, we don't know what it is. You had some kind of virus, right?
It was like, nobody knew. It was like pre pandemic shutdown. And then I kind of, I started to get better. I still wasn't like all the way [00:05:00] better, but I was functional and it was a really, um, tumultuous time in our business and in my life. And then the pandemic hit in about two weeks after. In March of 2020, after kind of the world went nuts and our platform crashed from the number of people trying to get online, um, I started feeling really sick and I thought I was just exhausted.
Like you and I weren't really sleeping or taking care of ourselves. Like I don't remember anything. It was like a total black hole. Like I just remember. , um, like my husband would leave food at the door, basically like I just worked every waking minute and I was also practicing law at that time. And so I was like literally working every waking minute,
Um, and I realized like at some point that I had a fever. And this is again, like months, basically weeks to months after having been acutely ill. And I smelled like a cough and, but you [00:06:00] know, whatever. I was like kind of wheezy, but I was generally had been functional and then all of a sudden I got this fever and so I started taking my temperature every day and like I had a fever and then the next day I had a fever and the next day I had a fever.
And I had the fever for almost a hundred days , which is not normal. and it was like anywhere from like a hundred 0.1 to like 102 degrees, just like every day, every time I took my temperature and I felt, you know, when you have a fever, you just don't feel right. So that was the first thing that happened.
So I was like, I just thought I was, um, working too hard. and I was like, too tired to get out of bed. So I was like working from my bed for like days at a time, like working all the time from my bed. So anyway, that's the beginning of the story. Sandy , I don't know if should, is there any, are there any questions about that part of it?
No, I, I just, I think it, it's such an interesting [00:07:00] time to be sick because. , we just felt Terri, like we were literally working 15, 16, 17, 18 hours a day. And so how would you ever even know that there was something else going on? Like we were to the brink of exhaustion. There was points where we just literally wanted to shut it down and walk away.
don't care about who we hurt or what money we lose, it's just like we cannot do this. So your fevers, I distinctly remember you just like being really hot and like holding your eyes and you'd be like, I gotta let you light on the floor as I was talking with you or trying to hire a C T O or whatever we were doing back then, like, it was just so conflated.
Like we couldn't like, oh my God, I, and I also remember having absolute fears of you. Like I would wake up. Total anxiety, panic that you were gonna go down like that. You were, I think this was a little bit later on, that you would, we knew we like it. It was a pandemic. It was named, it was this thing, and you were kinda like, do I have [00:08:00] this thing?
And I thought, oh my God, she's gonna be airlifted to Seattle. Yeah. And be on a ventilator. Mm-hmm. like that was my worst, worst fear. Of course. And I just, That is terrifying. And then also like, how am I gonna run this freaking company without you when we are in like mass chaos? Like mass uncertainty. Like, I don't, I just like that it was nothing compared to what you were doing, but I are, are feeling.
But I just was such a deep fear, like she's how it, she's not gonna, she's not gonna make it. She's not gonna make it through this. Like, yeah, she's, well, that's what my husband thought doing. Yeah. Yeah. Like my husband has since Yeah. Well, told me he thought I wasn't gonna survive and I, yeah. So I know like I was affecting so many people, like my sickness was affecting my child.
You, Nate in particular, um, because, Like you got because like the responsibility that we all share, like you [00:09:00] share a lot of responsibility with the people closest to you in your lives. Right? And so, and also like, um, yeah, I was having, that's, that's the other like, main symptom that I had early on in the first few months of l quote unquote long covid was like eye pain.
Like my vision would go, I was, I would have like really intense, like kind of sh like hotness behind my eyes and like pain in my eyes. And I also will add, because it like, I, I had this like lingering cough and like, um, kind of trouble breathing and then like nobody was talking about pulse oximeters or like any of that stuff until early on in the pandemic, right?
And then all of a sudden I was like, I should probably figure out what my oxygen levels are like I had no way to do that. Right, because like none, it's not normal. Like now you have that on your Apple watch and you have it on your like Fitbits and you have it like everyone, I have like two pulse, like pulse oximeters in my house at all times.
Like I, I spent the last couple years carrying one around with me. Like I didn't leave, like, I didn't actually like leave the house without a pulse oximeter in [00:10:00] my purse. But back then I didn't even know what it was. And. Um, it was, it was like the early days of the pandemic and the lockdowns happened and I was like, shit, I need to find my oxygen.
Like my sister-in-law's a nurse and she was like, what's your oxygen? I ha she lives 3000 miles away and I didn't know what to do. I like, called the doctor. I called my doctor, I called like the nurse lines. I called, I live on a remote island usually, right? So really far from everything. I called like the local clinic and I was just told do not come.
anywhere because in, if you don't have covid, there's a good chance you'll get it. So if you go off island, everything was totally locked down. Right? That's, remember when we were like washing our bill and stuff, like, it was like that kind of time. And so, um, a good friend of mine is like good friends with the paramedics where I live and he dropped a pulse imeter off, I think on my porch.
Um, anyway, I, and, and my, and like my husband ordered a couple from like [00:11:00] medical device companies and stuff, so eventually I, I found you one too, cuz remember they were all sold out and I was like, oh, I'll find one. And Yeah, like, I played Jenny for a second and go deep on the internet to find her. Exactly.
Somewhere in Canada actually. I got one. Yeah. Yeah. And my oxygen was like not normal. Like it wasn't, I wasn't like, need to go to the hospital and get on, get on a ven ventilator, but it was like 90. Which like some people would've said, go to a ventilator, sometimes go into the eighties. So I was like, I was like full on , I was sick and um, and I just kept going and I was like, well, , you know, whatever this is like, I don't wanna go take resources away from like people, like elderly people or people who are really, really sick.
Like, I'm okay, um, I can function. And I was really busy , like with lots of jobs. Like I had court cases, like I was going remotely and like zooming into courtrooms and hearings and then I was trying to like keep our tech company alive and like hire 20 people. Like it was a lot. And I was really sick. So, [00:12:00] Thank you for everything you did during that time to kind of like cold court, because I was kind of not fully competent and um, and that was a big time.
So, so I just wanna say like, so that was like kind of phase one of long Covid, it was like, oh, and I don't, I didn't have like a positive test, right? Because I never. Went anywhere, like, but every, but I have, um, I had, I don't know how many doctors I te telehealth doctors I consulted with and family in my, in my family that are medical practitioners.
So I had a diagnosis, like I have a diagnosis in my charts from March of 2020 of Covid. Um, but I didn't actually have a positive test at that point. Uh, so anyway, so then like a hundred day, like three months goes by and it's June. June of 2020 and I, things have just sort of like continued on, like it was basically just sort of the same for three months.
And you and I were in absolute chaos professionally. So like I don't, everything's kind of a blur from that time. But [00:13:00] then I woke up one morning in the, like four in the morning with like the most intense vertigo. I've ever experienced in my life. Like just, I woke, I know what day it was cuz it was my daughter's birthday,
So I, I have like a journal and a log of like every symptom and everything that was going on and it was like, I just woke up and I was in like a deep sweat. Like I think I broke the fever that night. because he didn't have the fever after that, like a hundred days. And then I woke up and just like drenched in sweat and it wasn't hot out and then, but everything was spinning.
and like I woke up and my husband woke up and he was like, you're not okay. Like, he just saw me like dripping sweat and I was so dizzy, like I couldn't even get to the restroom, um, by myself. And so then that's when the vertigo started and the fever broke, and then the vertigo started and the vertigo still, [00:14:00] um, it was very constant for probably six months.
And then less constant after that. And it still happens. Like I still have probably one or two bouts a month of it, but it was the most intense, that was the worst for me actually just being really, really dizzy all the time. It was terrible. I don't think there's a worse feeling in the world than, than that.
Yeah. And it, it, like there isn't, and especially when you need to look at a computer all day and try to function and to, you know, live in the world. But I will say at the time, like all these symptoms, like the fever, no one thought it was co like covid at all or related to co. Like there was no evidence that this thing even existed.
Like I was in the original Facebook group where the woman, the preschool teacher in Oregon named Long haulers. Like she named Long Covid. Like I was in that early group. I luckily like found community. Early on online, and I feel like that really saved my life because I, [00:15:00] I would've been so distraught going through something like this alone, like thinking.
I was dying thinking nobody in the whole world is experiencing this. And so I would like go in and I had people I could share my symptoms with. And I was, I think the first person in any of the Facebook groups I was in that talked about vertigo or being dizzy at all. Like it just was not even acknowledged at that point in time that dizziness was even remotely related to Covid at all.
Like it was just another thing. So, so that's when that started. And then my vision got really bad after that, so I had been having the stingy eyes with the fever. And then like my peripheral vision basically just went crazy and everything when I would turn my head, like things in the distance would be really blurry.
The only thing that wasn't really blurry is if I like was super still and looked at something up close. And so I was like, wow, okay, I'm gonna go blind. Like I'm literally gonna lose my vision now. Like how am I gonna function ? How am I [00:16:00] gonna like do my job and my other job, and how am I going to take care of my kid?
Like, I'm not gonna have any vision, meaningful vision. So that was terrifying. Um, so that was the next phase. And then I started seeing eye doctors. I think the first time I went to see an eye doctor or an ophthalmologist was in August of 2020. And there like many people with long covid, if you're listening to this story, I was told, oh, it like, there's nothing wrong with you
So that was also like the story of like, my life with a lot of medical professionals was like, oh, I don't see anything wrong with. Um, so, but I did find, and I wanna say like resource-wise, I found some glasses called Thera specs that, um, are like red light glasses. That really helped me with, uh, with just like not feeling as bad with my vision.
Like I still had vertigo and I still had blurriness, but they just sort of gave me a sense of ease. I don't know how to describe it. Like a lot of people wear them for migraines. [00:17:00] Mm-hmm. . Um, and they helped me a lot and they're, Super, super expensive. So that's one resource that I would throw out. And then eyedrops helped me a lot too.
Okay. . Um, okay. So then what was the next phase? So then that was pretty normal. For, so that was like the first six months of the, of long covid for me. And then it just kind of continued. Um, and then really my breathing and heart started to act up. So like the next year is really the story of my heart. And I know we've talked a lot about this cuz I've had panicked moments where I called you like thinking I was dying.
Mm-hmm. , which. Anyway, is terrifying, probably, and awful. But you've talked me off the ledge, so thank you. And um, so that started with like these really intense adrenaline drops and like my heart rate going down to like 40 beats per minute and then shooting up to like 150 or 160 beats per minute, within seconds.[00:18:00]
And, um, being totally debilitated by, like your breath gets taken away when that happens. And I'll be like sitting down working or in bed and my heart rate would drop really. suddenly, and then shoot up and spike. And then I had lots of sinus tachycardia, so my heart rate was like elevated kind of all the time for months.
Like it would just be like 110 beats per minute all day, every day for weeks. Like it just was beating way too hard and way too fast. Mm-hmm. . Um, and I like throughout this Yeah. You never took any time off? No. Like not even a weekend or like, Anything? No, and you know what I, I don't wanna say like, cuz that, that probably sounds like crazy, but I, I will say that for me, I, I think some people listening know this, I lost both my parents.
They were pretty young and so I have like a really massive fear of being sick. Like, [00:19:00] like it's a full on phobia, my relationship with like kind of medical problems. Work was, was such a powerful distraction for me. Like, because I really was intense. Like there was a lot going on and I was working on two court cases for my other, for my job, and then I had our company and I was like, literally every minute was focused.
And it was like actually a huge gift for me because if I had, I think been, it was still really hard and mentally traumatic to be that sick and scary, but if I did not have our company, to focus on. I don't know what would've happened to me. You know how like your mind is so powerful with your body, right?
Like that obviously our listeners know that like mind body connection is everything. And if I had like had all those hours to just obsess over what was happening to my body, I'm sure I would've been much worse. Like that's my belief. My belief about. You just would've spiraled out, like, yeah, I would've [00:20:00] lost it.
And like, you know, the suicide rate is really high with long covid, um, with people who have long covid, like they're, it's terrible. Right? And I, I totally get it because your body just is failing in random ways. And, um, doctors and many cases like can't, like it's better now, but not, still not good. But like in, in the early days, It.
It's like gas, medical gaslighting was going on, right? Like doctors didn't know what the hell was going on. Like the world was shut down. People were, the medical establishment was dealing with the acutely ill covid patients and like the people who were having all these random things like. We're not the priority, and no one knew what was happening.
Mm-hmm. . So it was like, it's not like, oh, you get this diagnosis and like the world rallies around you and you're sick and everyone's like a GoFundMe campaign. And you know, it's not that like, not that I ever wanna have that, but I, it was like, am I, is it in my head? Is my heart like going crazy because I'm [00:21:00] crazy?
You know, I, I mean, is my, like, is dizziness even related to this? Like, is my fever related? Like, nobody knew. And so, um, and I was so early, like I was in the very, very early group of people who got covid and so I was on the. Front end of all of the symptoms. So it wasn't like I knew what to expect. I would be the person who said, Hey, does anyone have this?
And then like a few days later somebody would say, oh, I'm having this now. Like it was that, like that riding the wave really. So. So thank God for work. Like, that's what I wanna say is like, thank God, cuz I would've been, I think in a way worse space mentally and physically if I wasn't working. Um, so, so what did you do?
Like, what are some of the things that you did to adapt your, your work to be able to survive? Like to be able to function? Yeah. So one thing that I realized really early on, I was terrified of like, again, dealing with [00:22:00] my parents, particularly my mom's illness. Like she passed away from cancer really kind of suddenly she had a diagnosis and then passed away four months later.
I was really scared of what would happen if I started being too sedentary and I had. Like heart problems. I was dizzy, I had trouble breathing. I didn't have enough oxygen, but like, damn, if I was gonna sit there all day, like I was not gonna let this thing take me down without a fight. So I went hiking like very slowly.
Almost every single day. Like I went on like a two mile hike and I luckily my home is in the woods next to a, a state park, like on an island with, it was amazing. And, and nobody was out, right? So it was like I was out in the world. Everyone was locked down and I was like out without a mask on in the woods at all wet with all weather.
just slowly walking. So I took a break, like every lunchtime, every single day, pretty much. My husband would take me and we would go, and I, like, there were days where I had to lay down on the [00:23:00] trail three or four times. I'd be so dizzy. Like I'd have to do like the EPLI maneuver for those of you who know what that is, like this like, um, kind of a physical therapy move in order to even get the dizziness to quell at all or my heart.
be way too high. It would be like 180 beats per minute, which isn't safe just to be walking. So I'd have to just like lay down until my heart would slow a little bit more. So I think that, honestly, this probably sounds nuts to people , but like hiking, like walking slowly, slowly walking. Um, and my doctor had said not to get my heart rate above 120 and for like lots of times I couldn.
I couldn't keep my heart rate below 120. Even just walking, sitting there. Very, very slow pace. Yeah. So, but I just went really slow and I think that like, that's something that I recommend and I think that like, that's something I've carried on to. I've really, walking is really important to me. Like it's so important to like balance your, um, like the [00:24:00] cortisol in your body and to deal with stress.
And I think that, . That's something that is, is really helpful to help you get through your work, your workday, even if you don't have long covid. Okay. And then what are some of the, uh, oh, well, before we go to the all of your, um, tools that you use, I want you to talk about you also left the island to get the heck outta a dodge for a while.
You, you took a little. And how did that affect you? Yeah, so that's such an interesting thing. And there's, I, I don't, like, I'm not a doctor, I didn't know everything but , um, I know my own body, so last year, so I had been sick for a year and a half straight. And, and obviously was like, it's an, it getting better.
Like it's a process where you get, I was getting better, but still, I'm still not all the way better. So after like last summer, , I was so scared to leave. Like I think a lot of us, I probably had some fear just based on the pandemic and like, you get scared to leave. [00:25:00] I, a lot of us, the first trip we took probably after lockdown was scary, but I decided to go to Yellowstone with my family, go to Montana and go to Yellowstone for like a week or 10 days.
So, and I was scared and almost didn't go at the last minute. So we went and I felt better than I had felt. In the whole, the whole covid situation. So what we did is we got home and we had a little ca pop-up camper. We sold it and we bought, immediately bought an Airstream and set out on a, on a three month trip last fall.
Um, and so, That was such an amazing, and I like, again, like, I was like, am I gonna survive this? Are we gonna be able to last on the road this long? Like I'm not, well, like I'm not gonna be able to hike anywhere. I'm not gonna be able to do anything. And I would say that that was the healthiest and the best I felt.
um, in the whole, in this whole time. And so I, I think that that was really magical. And I still, like, I, when we went to the Grand [00:26:00] Canyon and went to Sedona early on in our trip, like I couldn't really hike. I couldn't really walk very far. Like, I'm a person who looks like, why is that woman this age, like hobbling along with like holding on to her like family's arm.
So she. Fall over. Like that's what it was like. And, and in the Yellowstone trip last summer, or the summer before we went to Jenny Lake and did a hike and like, I couldn't do it. I, we took a boat, uh, for those of you who've done this hike, like you take a little boat across Jenny Lake and the Grand Tetons, and then there's um, there's like this hike you do, and then you hike back to this.
It's the parking lot and it's a really popular hike in the Tetons. And I took the boat and I couldn't, I couldn't do it. And there's like toddlers running past me and like elderly people hiking past me and I'm like, I look healthy , you know, I look normal. And I like, couldn't do it. So, um, I just wanna put that out there is like, you know, obviously with chronic illness and [00:27:00] disability, you don't know.
What other people around you are experiencing. But I knew that like mentally I felt better and I felt like I wanted to travel. And to me, traveling is a bomb and it's a healing experience. And so anyway, we went on this bigger trip right after that for three months, and by the time we got to like Florida and the southeast, , I was like almost normal.
Like I was so happy and I felt so good. And I think the sunshine was such good medicine and there's a lot of evidence now that melatonin is really, um, helpful if you have long covid. And I think that just the sunlight, like the melatonin and the relationship between your body and the sun is so powerful.
And I just, I felt so good. So that was a really, um, amazing. Decision and experience. And so I just would say that to anyone who's suffering from this, like seek out like infrared light or sun and see if that helps you feel better. Because for me it gave me a [00:28:00] lot of energy and a lot of relief from my symptoms.
Okay. And then let's hear like here you are today. Do you wanna just give us an update on like what your symptoms are or what you're experiencing now? Like what are you struggling with now? Yeah, I mean, I would say mostly I'm better. I don't have like, uh, amazing li I guess stability with my heart rate. So my heart still has a lot of.
Uh, uncontrollable episodes. I would say especially, um, stairs are really hard for me. Like I don't feel out of breath or anything, but my heart will just kind of go nuts. All of a sudden. It's like not linear, it doesn't make sense, and sometimes just sitting down that happens. And so, but like way less and not as extreme, like my resting heart rate.
Oh, this is another thing I'll say, like, I got an Apple watch early on in this process. , and that's been really powerful to see the trends, like my resting heart rate has gone down. It was like in the eighties, the mid eighties when I first [00:29:00] had Covid long covid. My resting heart rate and now it's like in the sixties and I'm not in like any shape like I
I'm not in any like better shape at all, but like that's pretty dramatic. For those of you, those of you that know anything about like health as your like heart rate variability in your resting heart rate numbers and mine have both improved, like really dramatically, so that's way better. And then I still have like vertigo episodes, right?
Like I said, a couple times a month where I'll just be like, we were at, um, this tiny house show here in, in the Southwest a couple weeks ago, and I was like, . I just had an episode like I couldn't function, like we were in this big, like big building and there's all these exhibitions and I just, it just hit me and like the world just starts spinning and there's nothing you can do.
And so it's like, it sucks. Like I would say, not knowing when it's gonna happen. I have this big fear of being out with my daughter, like alone because I [00:30:00] don't know if something's gonna happen that's gonna make it hard for me to drive home with her or be in the car with her. Um, but other than that, I would say I'm normal.
Like I just, other than these like , I know that sounds not normal, but like couple normal a month relative, pretty normal. Mm-hmm. , couple times a month, some like weirdo thing happens and then I'm like, oh. Okay. So on Covid, let's just summarize the things though. Apple watch, you're using, um, activity you're using.
Yep. Uh, what else are you using to manage. Yeah, so I have, um, been part of clinical trials. I've been part of like experimental medical regimes. I will just say because I was early on in this, I've done a lot of like, biohacking and experimenting with my body around long covid. So I don't wanna get into all those details.
So I've tried a lot of random things. But the one medication, um, I'll just say this in case it helps anyone. The one medication that I'm still on and that is, that seems to really be making a difference in my stability and [00:31:00] recovery, is called low dose Naltrexone, and it's something that I have to get from a compounding pharmacy.
It's, uh, it's something that I was prescribed by a neurologist in April of 2021, so pretty early, like a year into this, into my symptoms, and within about a month of starting that medication, I noticed a really dramatic difference in kind of like just a leveling off of my symptoms. So again, they become episodic.
Like they're randomly episodic, but it's not every day, all day. And so I don't know if it's time or random. Um, but that's a medication that I take. Obviously you have to talk to your doctor if you have long covid. And, um, it's a weird medicine, like people have been taking it in, like kind of the autoimmune community for decades.
Like a lot of MS patients take it. Um, And Naltrexone itself, it's not the same thing. Naltrexone itself, like at its full dose is, is um, an opioid [00:32:00] inhibitor. So it's something that like a heroin addict would take in order to, um, recover from an overdose. Yeah. Like not die from an overdose. And so it's kind of weird cuz it, when it's in your charts, like there's a lot of, I think, um, negative.
I, I don't know, rep. It has a negative reputation because if it looks like you're taking naltrexone, people think you're an addict. But that's not what it is. It's, it's this microdose basically of this medication. And I don't understand why it works or how it works, but, um, it's not, it's not something that cures you.
Like I have to take it in order to have the benefits of it. It's not like I take it for a little while and then I heal from it. Like, it's one of those things you take forever, um, until your body, or unless your body heals. So, That's the medication that I take. And I just wanna share that in case that's helpful for anyone to know to talk to their doctor about.
And I've been on it for a long time and I have had days where I've forgot to take it or where I've run out of it, and I can definitely feel it. . Um, [00:33:00] so just something to throw out there. And then I, and then , I'll just say, so I've, again experimented with a lot of medications, both pharmaceuticals and like supplements when we were moving.
Like cuz we, we've relocated this year and I was packing, I could only take what I could fit in our Airstream and in two cars, like our truck and our car. Like my supplement container is like one of those giant bins that you would like put your winter sweaters in. Like it's so big and it was like overflowing and I brought it into our Airstream.
There's nowhere to put it. And then I had like other supplementary boxes of supplements cuz I've studied so much and I'm in so many Facebook groups and I have had so many different kinds of doctors that I've worked with that. I have like so many supplements and what I realized is that like I actually feel better when I don't take them.
And this is something that I talked to you about, Sandy, cuz I was like, it was like a full-time job managing all the fricking supplements. Like when do you take magnesium and when do you need to take these B vitamins and [00:34:00] when do you need like all day? Like, like. Literally hundreds of bottles of supplements.
And at some point I just was like, I'm just gonna try not doing this cause I think they're making me a little sick. And so I stopped and I just take, like, if I'm getting sick, I'll take zinc or you know, whatever. But I stopped that and I feel better from that. So I just will throw that out there too, that supplements are like really unregulated and um, and I think people take a, like, unless you know what you're doing, I think you can make mistakes.
So, . That's one other thing that I'll just point out is that like there, I think at various times, like for example, when my heart was really erratic all the time, every day magnesium really helped. Like compression leggings really helped to study my heart. But in a situation where I am at now, I don't need to take magnesium three times a day.
Like my heart is okay and I monitor it with my watch. Yeah. So what do you think would've happened to you if you were working a corporate? [00:35:00] Yeah, so I wa I mean, I, I kind of was early on, like I, I was still a practicing part-time lawyer for a nonprofit, and I left that job in the end of 2020. Um, I should have left it sooner because I was so sick and because our company exploded.
But I wanted to finish a couple of cases I was working on. and there's no way I could have kept that job like over the next couple years. And it was, I feel, I feel so much for people who aren't entrepreneurs and who are, who encounter a chronic illness or a debilitating illness like this. Um, I certainly, if I had like a full-time corporate job where I was in.
You know, like a manager or an executive level. I certainly couldn't have done that job at all. Once I got long covid, um, it would've been impossible. And I, I know, cause I'm in community with a lot of people who have this illness that like many, it's, it's now officially in the United States a disability.
And a lot of people have left their careers completely like so people who are teachers or who were lawyers or [00:36:00] lots of doctors, cuz a lot of doctors and nurses got covid early on, like the OG Covid. Which, which I, I don't know for sure, but I think it was worse. Like, cuz I've. , you know, everyone's had it since then, right?
We, we've all had like all these other strains of it and that OG Covid man was like rough. And um, and so there's a lot of medical professionals that have long covid from the early, early in the pandemic, and they just like can't work. They've lost their careers and their livelihoods really. And so I just, I actually like, that's the other reason I wanted to do this episode was just to give another plug for entrepreneurship, because thank God for this.
Like, thank God for the flexibility to go on a. Like a crawl of a hike every day for 45 minutes in the middle of the day. And to be able to go and travel to the sunshine, right? And to be able to, um, like afford really the things like the medical bills and the supplements and the like. I, I wanted to say too, another thing that really helped me, Early on was a sauna [00:37:00] blanket from higher dose.
And infr light seems to really benefit. And like a low sauna really helped me. Like every night I would go lay in my sauna blanket. Um, and it, it was like, it would like regulate my system. So one of my diagnoses, I'll say this is disautonomia. . I don't know how many people have heard of it, but it's like the dysregulation of the autonomic nervous system.
So that's like your brain telling your heart to beat a certain way or your lungs to breathe. Like all those things that your body does behind the scenes that you don't have to do intentionally, that's your autonomic nervous system. And that's for me, what really got messed up with Covid and a lot of my symptoms from long covid we, my neurologist identified the dysautonomia was at, was, you know, like playing a role in that.
So, Like that's, it's expensive to be like chronically ill and to try to heal from that. And, um, so the ability to have this entrepreneurial, [00:38:00] um, like the benefits of being an entrepreneur, to have the finances, to have the flexibility, to have the freedom, all the stuff that we talk about that seems so empty and.
when you put it into context like this, it becomes so incredibly meaningful. Yeah. Like, thank God. And I was able to support my entire family and, and so my family could support me. Like my husband stopped working for two and a half years, a corporate job in engineering job so that he could take care of me and like the.
The grace of that, like the just is, is un, I can't even put it to words what that meant. Like I had someone there cause I was terrified of being alone. Like I literally thought every time he left the house to go to the grocery store, I was gonna like have a heart attack or die. So the idea of like having another human being that could be in the same house and then do the cooking, creating nutritious foods and meals, um, and taking care of our child.
A lot of stories [00:39:00] of parents, of moms who get sick, right? Like who they still have to take care of their kids. So I, um, I just wanna say like a deep bow, I guess, to our business for supporting us during this time. Cuz there's like, I literally don't know what it, what would've happened without it. . Yeah. No, I think that's a great, a great point that the work helped you, the flexibility, the income, like all the things we, so, you know, to put some like specifics and exactness to those words.
The freedom I think is really powerful. Yeah. All right. Anything else you want to share? You wanna move on to joy and hustle? Um, yeah, we can do joy and hustle. I think that's good. And I have a couple of things there. They're both kind of, I guess they're both because they support. They support you to be healthy and happy and safe when you have a business.
So one is this, just this [00:40:00] sauna blanket and it's a little pricey and I think that they have some other less pricey options, but I had this higher dose sauna blanket will link to it in the show notes. I bought it. I think they're kind of trendy now, so you've probably seen them around. But I bought it when it was like a weirdo thing to have a sauna blanket.
It's a weird plastic . Blanket thing that you, you lay in and there's lights inside and warmth. So that was really, really helpful. How, how much are they, Jenny? Just rough. It was like $500 roughly. Ok. Ok. I don't know how much it is now. And then I also wanna just put out a plug too for meal services, like just healthy food is everything when you're sick.
and having access to healthy food. And I think it's just a tremendous privilege to have that. And so, um, the one meal service that I have used and I still continue to use is sakara Life, which is also really expensive. So again, I know that's a point of privilege. I pay like $179 a week for three days of meals, of two meals.
And so it's not very much food. But, um, I don't have to think, like [00:41:00] for days where I. didn't, and I don't have, um, the ability to rely on my partner to cook. For me, I, eating healthy is really important and I just literally can take a packet, like a, a pre-made meal out of the refrigerator and know that I'm eating something nutritious.
Do you use those for lunches? I use them for breakfast and lunch. Okay. three days a week, cuz I would use them five days a week. But it's really, really expensive. Yeah, that's a lot. Yeah, it's a lot. So, um, yeah, so I just wanna put a plug for those. If you've ever thought of taking them. They do like discounts for your first, we'll link to them in the show notes as well.
They do discounts for your first order. Um, it's really expensive. Like, I feel like it's too, it's like I, food should be expensive. Like food is artificially cheap. Anyway, the whole economy is broken, but like, this is really expensive. So I feel almost embarrassed talking about it. But if, if you're in a position where like, I, I'd rather spend the money on this than on medical bills, right?
So as someone who's like juggling those two options, like to me, [00:42:00] eating healthy for me is the priority. So, um, Yeah, and I'll just say also like the, the doctors that helped me the most were a neurologist, like a holistic neurologist. Um, they're hard to find someone who is like a , you know, a board certified neurologist, but also is like open to kind of, Uh, Eastern medicine and things like that.
And then also, um, like a physical therapist was really helpful for a vesti vestibular physical therapy. So those two, two medical professionals are like, really, really great if you find yourself in this situation. Like they, um, they were more helpful than a lot of like, kind of the general doctors that I encountered and I encountered a lot of doctors so, That's always the case, I think.
Yeah. . Yeah. I just think the gps have limited ability to help a lot of, in a lot of, right. They have, like in this case, like you are the one, you're the patient educating them, right? Because they're like, You know, they just treated someone's ear [00:43:00] infection and then they're treating somebody's like, yeah, cough.
And like you're coming. I come in and I have like read 200 articles about something and I'm that obnoxious patient that's like, I think I have this, I think you need to test me for this. This is what my blood work said about this. So I just like obviously be an advocate too. Like I think that's the other message is, I had this like weirdo experience of being really early on in this wave of major illness and nobody knew what the heck was going on and I had to constantly advocate for myself.
And I also had to, um, Especially advocate because I didn't have a positive test early on. I, I, I afterwards have had positive antibody tests, like, but those didn't exist. Like there was no, nothing existed early on. And so, um, and I was refused to test. The one time I tried to take it because I was told I was too young, right?
So early in the pandemic, it was like an older person's. Illness. Like that's so like just be an advocate for yourself in your health and um, yeah, that's [00:44:00] the message. That's great. Jenny, thank you for sharing your personal story and being so vulnerable and giving us all the great details. I think it really matters, and I think there's a lot of people who are probably.
Suffering or keeping quiet about it or struggling. And so we just wanted to put this e episode out into the world to know, for all of you, to know that it's like you aren't alone if you are, um, struggling with long covid or other long form, uh, or, uh, a chronic illness. So, um, it's possible. It's all possible.
And, and thank you for all your tips and how you've survived, and I think you're remarkable. Thank you Sandy, and thank you for taking care of so much while I was sick. So, yeah, it goes both ways, of course. Alright folks, well I just wanna also say if you want to, um, if you have particular questions or resources, obviously go to your doctor, but I also wanna be a resource for you if you, um, If you have follow up questions to anything, so just send, uh, you can feel free to send our team a [00:45:00] message to hello@anneshe.co.
If there's something in this episode that if you wanna just share your story, if you wanna connect in some way, I'm happy to send you to some of the websites and resources that I've used, so I just wanna put that out there as well. Awesome. All right. Thanks, Jenny. Thank you. See you next week.